For most of our products we do allow to either license all active users or only the subset of users that requires to use our solutions. This comes with certain limitations in functionality where usage of our Addon cannot be related back to a specific user.

​This blog article explains the limitations and considerations you need to be aware of when purchasing a "per User" license. 

DocumentsCorePack

• Workflow capabilities disabled: This means that document automation inside Worfklows is not possible.

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ActivityTools, SmartBar, PowerSearch: (Elements embedded into Entity - forms)

• Form Element shows "no license" message: Users without a license will see a "license error" message instead of our AddOn. As this can take a severe amount of space on your form we do recommend to create separate forms for users with/without a license for our solutions.

More information about how to activate per User Licensing in Dynamics 365 can be found in this blog article.

This blog article outlines how licenses are counted in our system. The counting mechanism varies depending on the type of license being used. We differentiate here between two types of licenses – the Normal licenses and the TeamMember licenses. Below  are the two different license types and a description of how the count works for each. You will also find a description on where to find information about your counted licenses. 

❶ Normal licenses 
For the required licenses, all users that are activated and have as Access Mode “Read-Write” in Dynamics 365, are counted.  Users with “Administrative” as Access Mode are not counted.

There is the possibility to count only users with a security role for licensing. Important: We are counting user licensing assigned to the user directly or via team membership. To activate this feature the only thing you need to do is to create a new settingsKey for AutoMerge called “CountUsersWithSecurityRolesOnly” with value “true” as you can see in the figure below. More information about how to create  settingsKeys can be found here.

Figure 1: New SettingsKey - CountUsersWithSecurityRolesOnly

Additionally, there are users who have app access security roles as you can see highlighted in the figure below. App access security roles are predefined roles by Microsoft and are automatically assigned to users.  These security roles will not be counted by DCP until you modify them.

Figure 2: App access security roles

❷ TeamMember licenses
 If you have TeamMember licenses, please notice that these are counted different. TeamMember are assigned to specific license groups in Azure Active Directory and only two types are counted – the “DYN365_ENTERPRISE_TEAM_MEMBERS" and the "DYN365_TEAM_MEMBERS".

Find more information on how to activate TeamMember licenses here.

Where to find information about counted licenses?
Sometimes it may be unclear how we count the amount of relevant Dynamics 365 users for licensing.  In order to show which Dynamics 365 users are counted, we have included the "User Count Info" overview.  It can be accessed via the Web License Manager (Dynamics 365 > Settings > MSCRM-ADDONS area > DocumnetsCorePack (or any other addon). 

In the configuration window, please navigate to the ❶ Licensing server-tab. Here you can see the number of site licenses - in this case ❷ 22 users. For detailed information please hit the ❸ [User Count info]-button at the bottom (required “MSCRM-ADDONS.com General” solution version 2017.53 or 2018.53). 

Figure 3: User count info

​For DocumentsCorePack Online services you can access via the Service Configuration as well. Click on the [View & Install license]-button and navigate to Users as you can see in the figure below. No matter which way you choose this will open the User count info overview. 

Figure 4: User count info overview

In the so openend window, you can see four sections: 

• Summary: Displays basic information as you can see in the figure above
• Full licenses Users: Provides you with a list of all users which require a full license
• Licensing Relevant Roles: If a user has assigned such a security role, he is counted for licensing
• Licensing Unrelevant Roles: These are automatically assigned app access roles. If a user has these roles assigned only, he is not counted for licensing

Open the Full licenses Users by hitting the plus symbol on the left side. Here you can use the search box to look for specific users by their “User Name”. Hit on “Click to see the Roles”  on the right side in order to see the relevant roles assigned to that user. “(User)” means the role is directly assigned, “(Team)” means the role is assigned to a team that user is a member of.

Figure 5: Full license users

Via the Web License Manager,  you also have the possibility to download the whole overview by hitting the [Download]-button at the bottom (e.g. to send it to our support). 

Figure 6: Download user count info

​That's it! We appreciate your feedback! Please share your thoughts by sending an email to support@mscrm-addons.com. 

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This blog article outlines how to proceed if you have an issue with your Load Balancing service for DocumentsCorePack On-Premise. 

1) Take screenshots of the first three tabs of the configuration of ​ALL your services that are affected by the Load Balancing issue(highlighted in yellow in the figure below):
- General-tab
- Dynamics 365 Connection Setup-tab
- License-tab ​

Figure 1: Configuration of your services

2) Export the AutoMergeWorkingItem entity with all fields as CSV file 

Figure 2: Export AMWI as CSV file

3) Export EventLog: Applications and Services Logs - www.mscrm-addons.com folder

Figure 3: Export EventLog

Please send all the files  and a short description on which steps were taken to support@mscrm-addons.com.

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That’s it! We appreciate your feedback! Please share your thoughts by sending an email to support@mscrm-addons.com.

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If there are many documents to be processed by a DocumentsCorePack service, it may occur that one service is not enough. This issue can be solved by installing a DocumentsCorePack (DCP) ServerBased Load Balancing Service. This article outlines the functionality of such a DCP Load Balancing Service and how to install it. 

Requirements: DocumentsCorePack Server Based (Online/OnPremise) version 2016.173 and higher

The functionality of the Load Balancing Service
Usually, if documents are generated by a service, all documents are assigned to the same service. No matter, if the documents are being processed as batches or single documents. The DCP SB Service processes one job after the other in the queue - comparable to a printing service. Because single documents are prioritized, the generation will always be processed between the batch document generation. This is why it can be really helpful to have multiple services to get a better performance.

The logic of the  LoadBalancer works as described in the following figure. The main priority always has the manually triggered document generation for single and batch documents. The LoadBalancer will always have one service reserved for single document generation - DCP Service 1, one for batch document generation and processes/workflows - DCP Service 2 and another one only for batch document generation - DCP Service 3. This means that only one queue is available for processes/workflows in your configuration because they run in the background and have a lower priority.

This is the minimum package of the DCP SB Load Balancing Service. It is possible to add more services to your LoadBalancer, where you can define more than one service for single document generation and batch document generation. 

Figure 1: Functionality of the DCP SB Load Balancing Service (example with 3 working services)

How to configure a Load Balancing Service online? 
First of all, please create a new service in DCP SB Online (If you have not set up a service yet, please have a look at this video or at the corresponding blog article). Once you have created a new service, you will be provided with the Online Configuratin window where you can configure your service in detail. If you have already configured a service, you get an overview of your hosted service(s). 

The Load Balancing licenses can be found on our website. You first have to choose which size of DCP you require and in the so opened window you can buy the DCP Load Balancing Service.  The minimum package contains three services. It is possible to add more services to your LoadBalance. This guarantees that the documents are generated as fast as possible. 

​The configuration for Load Balancing Service is very easy. Select the service you want to configure in the Online Configuration window and click on the [configure load balancing]-button (highlighted in yellow).​

Figure 2: Online Configuratin window

The so opened Load Balancer Configuration window provides you with information about how many ❶ Available Load Balancer Services you have. Here you can specify how many load balancer you want to configure ❷ (please notice: there must be at least three) and how many services you want to ❸ reserve for single documents only. 

For example: There are 5 Load Balancing licenses available and want to configure all 5 and reserve 2 of them only for single documents and the rest are for batch document generation (see figure below). 

Figure 3: Load Balancer Configuration window

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How to create a Load Balancing Service in DocumentsCorePack Server Based On-Premise
(If you have not installed a service yet, please have a look at this article)

The creation of a Load Balancing Service in DCP Server Based On-Premise is different than in DCP SB Online. Therfore you need to set up a DCP SB service and categorize it as Load Balancing service. We recommend naming the service according to its future task (here: DCPLoadBalancer). Next, you create some more services and categorize them as subordinated to the Load Balancing Service.

Set a category for your Load Balancing Service
Basically you have to differentiate between the category for the main service and the category of the sub-services. 

The category number for the  main service consists of six digits and follows the below structure:

99XXYY

99..... categorizes the service as Load Balancing Service 
XX..... defines how many services are subordinated to the Load Balancing Service 
YY..... defines how many of these subordinated services are reserved for the generation of single documents only. It is mandatory to have at least 2 worker services for batch operations. That means the minimum configuration is 990301. If it is needed to have multiple single document services, it is mandatory to have at least 4 worker services and the configuration is 990402.

For example:
990502... There are 5 services subordinated to the Load Balancing Service and the first two services process single documents only. The other three services are reserved for the generation of batch documents. 

991105... There are 11 services subordinated to the Load Balancing Service and the first five services process single documents only. The other six services are reserved for the generation of batch documents. 

The categories must be set in the category field of the DCP Server Server Based On-Premise Service (highlighted in yellow below). However, it is recommended to set the batch delay to 10 seconds. 

Figure 4: Load Balancing Service for DCP ServerBased On-Premise

The Load Balancing Service can have many subordinated sub-services. The category number for the sub-service starts with 10 as you can see in the figure below. For each additional sub-service, the category number increases by 1 and continues with 11, 12, ..... As explained before, the category must be set in the category field, highlighted below.

Figure 5: Set category for the sub-service

How to remove the Load Balancing service (On-Premise)

• Make sure there is only one DCP Service running for the organization with the Category: 0
• Restore the default value for the “AzureServiceName” settingskey
  The name of the key must be "AzureServiceName" and the value has to be “none”
• Delete the “LBConfig” Settingskey
• Shut down and restart the DCP service
• Clear your browser cache and restart your browser

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That's it! We appreciate your feedback! Please share your thoughts by sending an email to support@mscrm-addons.com. 

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This blog article outlines how to proceed if attributes, options are not displayed when using the DocumentsCorePack Template Designer. ​The issue seems to be only appearing for Intel On Board Graphics when using multiple monitors.

Affected sections are for example the entity type, the attributes in the DCP Template Designer on the right side, the settings in the Advanced Template Settings dialog and the options in the Condition Field dialog as you can see in the figure below.

Figure 1: Condition Field - missing options

​If you are facing this problem, please go to File > Options > General and enable the Optimize for Compatibiltity checkbox in your MS Word (highlighted in the figure below). 

Figure 2: General settings - Optimize for compatibility

After a restart the affected sections should display the data again properly. ​

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That’s it! We appreciate your feedback! Please share your thoughts by sending an email to support@mscrm-addons.com.

This blog article refers to Azure Active Directory (AAD) and outlines how to proceed if you are using the location condition in AAD conditional access and get the following error message "Blocked by conditional access". This error message can occur when creating a service for AttachmentExtractor or DocumentsCorePack. 

The location condition is the most common condition and enables you to tie access controls to the network locations of your users. More information on how to configure the location condition can be found in this article. 

Error handling
The following error message "Blocked by conditional access" means that we cannot access your Dynamics 365. The location condition in your AAD blocks access for users accessing a service from specific countries/regions or IP ranges.

Figure 1: Error message: Blocked conditional access

IMPORTANT: 
You must extend your local condition by two further IP addresses in any case! You MUST include the configuration website (23.100.59.197) AND the service data center. Please notice, that you must specify the instance your service will be running on (e.g. EU North Live4). 

IP addresses of the instances:

Figure 2: Instances

If your data center is not listed here, please contact our support for further details. 

That’s it! We appreciate your feedback! Please share your thoughts by sending an email to support@mscrm-addons.com.

This blog article outlines how the PowerDialer sorts phone calls. First, the PowerDialer prioritizes calls where the user is the owner, then by priority of the call (high, normal, low).

After, it is possible to sort calls by a text field, number field or date field.

In case, the PowerDialer should take ascending order by a text subject field, then the user must set a server-side setting key "PTMPriorityString" with the value "subject". 

In case, the PowerDialer should take the ascending order by a number index field, then the user must set a server-side setting key "PTMPriorityInt" with the value "index". 

In case, that the PowerDialer should take the ascending order by a date-time actual start field, then the user must set a server-side setting key "PTMPriorityDateTime" with the value "actualstart". 

As a value of the key setting, the attribute name should be used. 

Only one setting key for setting the order can be set.

Figure 1: PowerDialer: Sorting of phone calls

An awesome week in the country of bikes, cheese, clogs, Heineken ....  ended. We had such a great time last week at eXtreme365 and User Group Summit in Amsterdam. Thank you for joining us! It was a pleasure for us to be part of such a great experience and to meet old and also new business partners and customers. 

The week started with extreme365 with a lot of great content from Microsoft and partners. It was a high-energy event where we could gain a deep-dive understanding of Microsoft´s roadmap, expert community insight on overcoming real-world challenges and exceptional relationship building. The atmosphere at eXtreme365 was perfect, which was due to the excellent speakers and truly informative sessions. The event was amazing and full of great people.

Followed by User Group Summit with crowds of people, great exhibitors and a lot of new contacts and customer meetings. Amazing keynote speakers, small group sessions, gripping speeches and lots of networking opportunities converted this event into a Microsoft Dynamics 365 festival. All in one we had great sessions and learned great Dynamics people! 

eXtreme365 & UG Summit - photo gallery

Also, we had the chance to showcase "Professional documents in Dynamics 365 for customer engagement PowerApps & Flow" live in front of a responsive audience. Michael Dohr outlined excellently how to standardize, simplify and automate your document processes with DocumentsCorePack. He showed different options to work with documents in: 

• Customer Engagement: document design, generation, processing and automation within Dynamics 365
• Flow: Generate and process documents in Microsoft Flow
• PowerApps: Generate and process documents in a Canvas-App
• Simple template design within Microsoft Word  

He also highlighted the values and benefits of our partner network, as well as the main advantages of our solutions for Microsoft Dynamics 365. It was awesome - crowded rooms at both events! 

All this mixed with Amsterdam spirit. We could not have spent this week better!
Thanks to all who came to meet the team! 

This blog article outlines the AttachmentExtractor plugin file access behavior if your service stops running. Please consider the following information: 

The plugins are license independent and will work regardless of the service's license state. 

SharePoint:
The plugin will always return a file as a .url link if it cannot access the stream. 

• For Server2Server authentification the file access to stream the content of a file is requiring the service to run. The reason is that a new JWT token has to be created once every hour, which is not possible from within the plugin.
  Please notice: You must switch to Office 365 to have access to your attachments after stopping a service.  

• Using Online Office 365 login is independent of the AttachmentExtractor service and will be able to access the file streams, as long as the credentials are valid. 

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AzureBlobStorage (ABS):

• ABS is independent of the AttachmentExtractor service and will be able to access the file streams, as long as the SAS-Token is valid. 

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That’s it! We appreciate your feedback! Please share your thoughts by sending an email to support@mscrm-addons.com.

This blog article outlines how to execute a workflow for each record in a batch process. Please also have a look at this blog article about how to process a generated document in a workflow from the dialog (in the single case). 

Please notice: The batch can ONLY run workflows that have been configured for the AutoMergeWorkingIntem entity.  In order to process the records themselves, a sub-workflow has to be triggered, which can be done by the custom workflow activity "DCPWorkflowSandbox:TriggerSubWorkflow" that comes with the installation of our solution.

Within this tutorial, we will create such workflows step-by-step. The result will be an invoice which will be sent to a batch of customers and after the terms of payment will be updated to Net 30 in Dynamics 365 for these customers as you can see in the figure below.

Figure 1: The result: Updated terms of payment

Step 1: Create sub-workflow 
Please open your Microsoft Dynamics 365 and navigate to Settings > Processes. In the My Processes - area, click on the [New]-button in order to create a new workflow.  A dialog pops up. Type in ❶ the name of your workflow, determine ❷ an entity - Contact in this case and select ❸ Workflow as the process category. Afterwards, hit the [OK]-button. 

Figure 2: Create a new workflow

The window below pops up, where you can configure your workflow in detail. Please check the ❶ As an on-demand checkbox in the Available to Run-area and as Scope select ❷ Organization. Next, please add a new step by hitting on the [Add Step]-drop-down menu and select ❸ Update Record. 

Figure 3: Update record

 

As soon as the step has been added to your workflow, please enter ❶ a name that remains you of what it contains, e.g. Update contact. Then open the drop-down menu, select ❷ Contact and hit the ❸ [Set Properties]-button. 

Figure 4: Contact: Set properties

The dialog below opens. It allows you to configure your workflow. In this case, you have to select in the ❶ Payment Terms drop-down menu Net 30. To finish the workflow, please do not forget to click on the ❷ [Save and Close]-button. 

Figure 5: Set properties: Update payment terms

After finishing the configuration, do not forget to activate your so created workflow by hitting the [Activate]-button located at the top.

Step 2: Create the AutoMergeWorkingIntem workflow which triggers the sub-workflow
As explained before, please create a new workflow. The window below pops up, where you can configure your workflow in detail. Please check the ❶ As an on-demand checkbox in the Available to Run-area and as Scope select ❷ Organization. Next, please add a new step by hitting on the [Add Step]-drop-down menu and select the ❸ DCPWorkflowSandbox - TriggerSubWorkflow workflow activity. 

Figure 5: DCPWorkflowSandbox - TriggerSubWorkflow

Next, please configure your workflow. Please set the cursor in the ❶ PrimaryRecordUrl-field and select ❷ PrimaryRecordUrl in the drop-down menu in the Form Assistant, click on the [Add]-button and hit the [OK]-button below (highlighted in yellow). The PrimaryRecordUrl-field is filled now. Then please search ❸ the sub-workflow "Update contact" you created before and do not forget to hit the [Save and Close]-button at the top.

Figure 7: Set Custom Step Input Properties

After finishing the configuration, do not forget to activate your so created workflow by hitting the [Activate]-button located at the top.

That´s it - you can now use your workflow - Trigger "Update contact" workflow in the DCP dialog (please have a look at figure 11 at the bottom). Considering that sending an invoice to customers and updating the terms of payment is a commonly used action, we recommend creating a one-click-action to automate the process. So please continue with step 3. 

Step 3: Create a Batch One-Click-Action
Please open the DocumentsCorePack Config Page by navigating to Dynamics 365-> Settings -> MSCRM-ADDONS -> DocumentsCorePack -> One-Click-Actions and hit the [Create Document]-button. You have to create a new One-Click-Action for the entity Contact in this case, so please hit ❶ the [New Batch]-button and type in ❷ the name of your One-Click-Action. 

Figure 8: Create New Batch

 

After hitting the [OK]-button, you will be provided with the configuration window for Batch Actions. More information about how to configure a One-Click-Action can be found in this blog article. Important is, that you check the Run workflow checkbox in your Processing Settings and select the so created workflow: Trigger "Update contact" workflow (highlighted in yellow below). 

Figure 9: Processing settings

Figure 10: DCP dialog: Available One-Click-Actions

Hit the [Next]-button to continue. As shown in the figure below, the dialog ❶ attaches the invoice as an email attachment and by checking the ❷ Run workflow checkbox you can start the so created workflow, which triggers the "Update contact" as you can see below. 

Figure 11: The result 

The result will be an invoice which will be sent to a batch of customers and after the terms of payment will be updated to Net 30 in Dynamics 365 for these customers (as in figure 1).

That’s it! We appreciate your feedback! Please share your thoughts by sending an email to support@mscrm-addons.com.